64 No. 73 JUSTICE or academic communication, are...unlikely to be seen as harassment.”23 Universities are also obliged to provide their services with reasonable skill and care, including the provision of a safe and satisfactory educational environment for all. In practice it is university codes of conduct rather than legal regulation that are the principal factors shaping the day-to-day environment. Nevertheless, the failure to satisfactorily address complaints under university regulations could potentially be challenged via an appeal to the Office of the Independent Adjudicator. It is therefore clear that universities face an ongoing challenge of protecting and fostering free speech, preventing discrimination and harassment of those who share a relevant protected characteristic, and ensuring that the central purposes of the university – knowledge production, teaching, and research – are at the heart of all its policies, processes, and activities. 3. Academic Freedom and Antisemitism In recent years, universities have faced criticism for placing more importance on their equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) duties – that is, the prevention of alleged harassment and discrimination against individuals with a protected characteristic – than academic freedom. As a result, there have been high-profile legal challenges to alleged harassment, bullying, “no platforming” or “mobbing” by staff and students of academics and students who held what were, in the immediate context of the university, relatively unpopular or heterodox opinions. In those cases, attempts were made to constrain the speech of those people. This has been particularly egregious in the context of discussions about sex-based rights and the rights of transgender individuals, a topic that we will not discuss in detail owing to space constraints.24 Regarding antisemitism, and in particular Israel-related antisemitism, the balance between academic freedom and EDI has often seemed to tilt in the opposite direction. Rather than prioritizing the prevention of potential harms to Jewish staff and students, here the demand for “free speech on Israel” is the dominant position. Indeed, claims that harms are being inflicted upon Jewish staff and students are commonly portrayed as cynical attempts to suppress legitimate political criticism of Israel. The very idea that some forms of expression about Israel or Zionism might constitute antisemitism is routinely dismissed as a politically motivated “smear” or as pro-Israel propaganda.25 The risk of harm to staff and students is especially acute when a minority of academics, backed by the most vocal elements of the student body, seeks to impose a single set of ideological and political positions upon entire disciplines and departments. Those who make counterarguments can find themselves subject to social ostracization, vexatious complaints, or political protests. Others too often remain silent for fear of similar reprisals. This development of ideological monocultures within certain disciplines and departments in the arts, humanities, and social sciences poses a distinct threat to academic freedom, not from political, social or economic forces external to the university, but from within academic departments and disciplines themselves. The risk is exacerbated when the hegemonic position within a department is replicated and reinforced by the most vocal student political movements outside the classroom. In such cases, the right to free expression on campus may begin to hinder, rather than support, the right of academic freedom within the university. The tendency towards an ideological monoculture within certain departments and disciplines when it comes to questions of Israel-related antisemitism has been a crucial factor in turning many British campuses into a 23. Ibid. 24. For an account of “academic mobbing” in the context of the sex and gender debates, see Ian Pace, “Academic mobbing – What university management needs to know,” SEX MATTERS (2024), available at https://openaccess. city.ac.uk/id/eprint/33445/ 25. David Schraub has described the tendency to immediately reject, deny or delegitimize Jewish claims of antisemitism, without further consideration, as “epistemic antisemitism.” See David H. Schraub, “The Epistemic Dimension of Antisemitism,” 15 JOURNAL OF JEWISH IDENTITIES 153-179 (2022). The notion that Jewish people cynically use claims of antisemitism as a cover for the political defence of Israel – that is, accusations “that complaints of antisemitism” made by Jewish people “are fake or smears” – was ruled to be a form of antisemitism in the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s investigation into the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership; see “Investigation into antisemitism in the Labour Party,” EHRC (Oct. 2020), at 28, available at https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/ files/investigation-into-antisemitism-in-the-labour-party. pdf. There is also a substantial philosophical literature on epistemic injustice, stemming from Miranda Fricker, EPISTEMIC INJUSTICE: POWER & THE ETHICS OF KNOWING (Oxford University Press, 2007).
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